Farewell to Howard Hampton

I’m sad to see Howard Hampton go. He has always been one of the most of the most sincere politicians around. I have always admired his principles. Hampton has always fought for what he believed in. I may have disagreed with him on policies, but he was always genuine in what he believed in. I also applaud him for always supporting gay rights, long before Ontario Liberals had jumped on the bandwagon. When NDP Premier Bob Rae allowed his entire caucus, including his cabinet, a free vote on the NDP government’s same-sex benefits, Hampton was one of the courageous 56 NDP MPPs (along with 3 Liberal MPPs) to vote for the same-sex benefits package. Sadly the majority of elected politicians in Ontario in 1994 were unwilling to allow for same-sex equality. Many of the 68 MPPs to vote against the same-sex legislation have changed their views and are now in favour of same-sex benefits and same-sex marriage.

There are several names mentioned as possibilities to replace Hampton as leader. NDP MP David Christopherson has already endorsed his provincial seatmate Andrea Horwath for leader. Also mentioned are NDP MPPs Peter Tabuns, Michael Prue, and Cheri DiNovo. Former NDP MPPs Marilyn Churley and Frances Lankin are mentioned. But Churley is the federal NDP candidate for Beaches—East York and Lankin is firmly entrenched as the head of the GTA United Way. Any of the NDP MPs from Ontario are also possibilities such as Charlie Angus from Timmins—James Bay.

I am a Liberal so I can’t endorse a candidate. But I say after the end of this weekend – let the leadership jockeying begin!

Alexa McDonough retiring

Alexa McDonough will not run in the next federal election. I am surprised by this. 63 is fairly young for a politician to retire. But Alexa has been involved in politics for almost 30 years, so she has earned her retirement. There are so many candidates from the Liberals and NDP that could possibly replace her in her Halifax riding it is mind-boggling. On the Liberal side, I can think of several names. One possibility is a political comeback by former Halifax MP Mary Clancy who represented the riding from 1988 to 1997. She is currently president of the Halifax riding association. I'm also wondering about a possible second attempt by United Church minister Kevin Little who was the Halifax Liberal candidate in the 2000 election. Another possibility is 2006 Halifax Liberal candidate Martin MacKinnon. MacKinnon had already won the nomination in 2007 to run in the next election. However last October he resigned his nomination to take another job. Now that the seat has been opened up he may regret this decision. If he wants the nomination back he will have to run for it.

On the NDP side possible candidates being discussed are former Nova Scotia NDP leader Robert Chisholm, 2006 Central Nova candidate Alexis MacDonald, and NDP MLA Maureen MacDonald. Any of the other Halifax NDP MLAs are possibilities. One thing holding back all of the Halifax MLAs is that the Nova Scotia NDP could form government sometime soon and running federally could deny them a chance to be in cabinet. I also wonder whether 1984 Halifax NDP candidate Tessa Hebb is interested in running. That may not be likely becaue I think she may live in Ontario now. Her son Matt, however, was the Nova Scotia NDP campaign director for the 2003 NS election. I also wonder whether 1988 Halifax NDP candidate Ray Larkin would be interested in running. Similarly, I wonder whether 1993 Halifax NDP candidate Lynn Jones would be interested in running.

I'm rooting for the Liberals to take back the riding. Nevertheless, Alexa will be truly missed by everyone.

Ken Livingstone and George Smitherman

I am disappointed in the election results from London, England. Labour Mayor Ken Livingstone lost and conservative Conservative Boris Johnson won. I wanted Livingstone to win. He was centre-left but I like him in particular because he has consistently been opposed to the Iraq War. The result is also disappointing because Livingstone was already planning to run for another term in 2012. Livingstone has conceded defeat but ominously said that he wants to be mayor when the 2012 Olympics happen. That would mean challenging Johnson in 2012. But ousting a one-term incumbent would be difficult. Livingstone’s political career thus may sadly be over.

Another interesting fact relating to mayors is that there are rumours that Ontario Health Minister George Smitherman wants to run for Toronto mayor in 2010. The idea is that Smitherman is actually considering challenging David Miller. I am actually concerned by this. Not because of David Miller. Miller’s second term as mayor has been problematic. Nevertheless, for Smitherman to run for mayor would require for him to resign his seat at Queen’s Park. It would also mean he would have to resign his cabinet position. In fact Smitherman might have to resign his cabinet position early. Nominations open in January 2010. If Smitherman were serious about running for mayor, he’d have to register early in order to mount a credible campaign. Doing a year-long campaign for mayor while being a cabinet minister is out the question. Therefore Smitherman would have to resign his cabinet position early in the year. I expect that he would also be under pressure to resign his seat at Queen’s Park early in the year as well. The reason for this is that it would be assumed that he would rarely attend legislative sessions while out campaigning for mayor. In any event Smitherman would have to resign his legislative seat before the municipal filing deadline. Failing to resign his seat before the municipal filing deadline would make his name be removed from the list of municipal candidates. Any such resignation would create a by-election in Toronto Centre. Sadly Toronto Centre isn’t as strong a Liberal seat provincially as it is federally. In the recent federal Toronto Centre by-election, Bob Rae got 59% of the vote. However in the recent provincial election, Smitherman received only 47% of the vote, compared to 20% for the Tories and 18% for the NDP. PC leader John Tory lives in Toronto Centre. Thus if he hasn’t managed to get a seat by then Tory could run in Toronto Centre. I think a Toronto Centre provincial by-election should be avoided if possible and therefore I have reservations about Smitherman running for mayor. But that choice is Smitherman’s to make and I would encourage him to think it over carefully.

Quebec provincial by-elections

There will be 3 provincial by-elections in Quebec on May 12th. One of these is in the riding of Hull. I would be incredibly surprised if any party other than the Liberal Party won the by-election in Hull. I interestingly found an editorial written by Fred Ryan that discusses the Hull by-election. The editorial says that the share of the vote for the PQ in the Hull riding has been growing(http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/city/story.html?id=e66221f2-93e8-4ad2-9e8f-ccdcf904ab38). However, I looked at election results for Hull and found the opposite to be the case.

Looking at elections from 1994 onwards, we get the following:

1994 election: PQ – 41.12%
1998 election: PQ – 32.02%
2003 election: PQ – 25.47%
2007 election: PQ – 23.93%

As you can see the PQ vote in Hull has actually been dropping.

As a side note, in the 1995 referendum Hull voted about 70% NON and 30% OUI. In the 1992 Charlottetown Accord referendum Hull voted about 44% NON and about 56% OUI. In the 1980 Quebec referendum Hull voted about 67% NON and about 33% OUI.

The PQ remains a sovereigntist party. Hull has twice voted overwhelmingly against Quebec sovereignty. Therefore I personally feel that it is not a good idea for federalist voters in the Hull riding to vote PQ as a protest vote. Electing a PQ MNA, especially one in such a federalist riding, advances the PQ’s sovereignty agenda and I do not believe federalists should vote to advance the sovereigntist agenda even indirectly. I believe that in the circumstances it is best for Hull to have an MNA from the governing party which is the Liberals. This may sound cliché but indeed it would be a government MLA who would best be able to fight for improved health care service in Hull.

The other two by-elections are in ridings that were held by the PQ. One of them was held by former MNA Diane Lemieux who resigned her seat over disagreements with party leader Pauline Marois. The other riding was vacated by former PQ leader Andre Boisclair who chose not to stick around after being forced out of the party leadership. These two ridings are likely to stay PQ. In one of them, former Bloc MP Maka Kotto is running for the PQ. Kotto’s resignation, however, created a vacancy at the federal level that has created a potential by-election. I have long found that Quebec, especially at the provincial level, has more by-elections than other provinces. This seems to be because Quebec politicians, especially those at the National Assembly, are more readily willing to resign their seats than politicians in other provinces. The Charest government is currently doing well right now in terms of popularity and I wish all 3 Liberal candidates the best of luck.

By-election results

I have mixed feelings about this week’s by-election results. The Liberals did incredibly well in the Toronto by-elections and increased the Liberal vote percentage in both ridings by several percentage points. The Conservative went down several points in Toronto Centre and went up only .76% in Willowdale. I personally do not consider such a marginal increase in the Tory vote to be very significant. My feelings are mixed however because the by-election results outside Toronto were far worse news for the Liberals. The Liberals lost the Northern Saskatchewan riding badly but I was not surprised by that. I was expecting the Liberals to lose that riding. We badly messed up our chances in that riding by appointing Joan Beatty over the wishes of the powerful and influential David Orchard supporters in the riding. Orchard wanted to run for the Liberals in the by-election and was miffed at being denied a chance to do so. Had Orchard been the candidate it would have still been a tough by-election for the Liberals but the Liberals would have had a fighting chance. Causing so much controversy by appointing Beatty removed any chance the Liberals had in the riding. Now Beatty has no political office and I don’t think she would be allowed run in a by-election for her old Cumberland provincial seat after having already defected from the NDP.


Vancouver Quadra was also bad news for the Liberals. The Liberals held the riding by a mere 151 votes. The Liberal vote in the riding dropped significantly and the Tory vote surged. The Green vote surged as well from low single digits to 13% of the vote. On election night I was shocked when the final two polls came in to see that the Liberal lead had shrunk to 151 votes. Those final two polls must have been won by a landslide by the Tories. Now the Tory central party wants a recount of the results. I highly doubt that a recount would change the outcome but it could delay Liberal Joyce Murray’s ability to take her seat in parliament. From what I read, Tory candidate Deborah Meredith was not consulted on this recount ahead of time and the central party announced the desire for a recount without talking to Meredith first.

So my feelings are very mixed considering the incredibly strong showing for the Tories in the two Western Canadian by-elections. Now there is unfortunately a whole new set of by-elections that the Liberals could always lose. These by-elections would occur if the government does not fall. The riding of Westmount—Ville-Marie is already vacant. It was held by the Liberals and astronaut Mark Garneau is the Liberal candidate. Saint Lambert (south of Montreal) is also already vacant as former Bloc MP Maka Kotto recently resigned his seat to run for the PQ in a provincial by-election. Two more ridings, both held by the Liberals, will become vacant in the near future. Guelph Liberal MP Brenda Chamberlain has announced that she will resign her seat on April 7. Don Valley West Liberal MP John Godfrey has announced that he will resign his seat on July 1 to accept a position as headmaster of a Toronto French school. Guelph is very iffy for the Liberals because the Liberals only won the seat last time with 38% of the vote and only 8% over the Tories. The NDP and Greens had a strong showing in the riding as well. In the recent provincial election, the Greens received a whopping 19.5% of the vote. That means that in a by-election even the Greens could win the riding. The NDP has a star candidate – Thomas King. King is a prominent Metis writer and commentator who talks extensively about Metis and aboriginal issues. The Conservatives have a well known candidate – Guelph City councilor Gloria Kovach. Her ability to be elected to Guelph council could propel her to parliament. The Liberals have a much lesser known lawyer. In a by-election the riding could go to any of the four major parties including the Greens. The Greens are a particularly distinct possibility due to the 19.5% they got in Guelph in the provincial election.

Don Valley West was won by 20% over the Tories with 53% of the vote. Local gay United Church minister Rob Oliphant has been nominated for the Liberals. The Tories have nominated the 2006 candidate John Carmichael. This riding is not as safe for the Liberals as Willowdale and in a by-election it could sadly conceivably go Conservative. The Liberals are very likely to again lose Saint Lambert which they lost in the 2004 election so a Liberal loss there would be no surprise. Sadly none of the upcoming by-elections look like a sure bet for the Liberals.

However, I am still delighted at the wonderful Toronto by-election results. Another bright note is that the Liberals easily won the popular vote of the 4 by-elections put together.

McGuinty, Dion, and America

I am glad to see that Dion has sided with McGuinty on the more seats for Ontario issue and says that in contrast to what Peter Van Loan said, McGuinty is actually a great man of Confederation.


Barack Obama will probably win the North Carolina primary in the US today. Whether that alone shifts him into front-runner status remains to be seen. My endorsement is Hillary Clinton but I have no problem with Obama becoming President. All that really matters to me is that the Dem nominee can beat the GOP nominee.

Prohibative organ donation restrictions

I would like to express my concern over this new Health Canada policy that seeks to exclude sexually active gay men from donating organs. It opens the Harper government up to accusations of being homophobic. Unfortunately it zeroes in on a single group and reinforces stereotypes. STDs spread in the gay community but this is not inherently due to being gay. There are historical and sociological factors to do with promiscuity. In the articles I read about this I was seeing a lot about families being questioned on these things after a donor is dead. This seems to discount the numerous existences of live donors. This new policy is a blanket ban that doctors can only override in exceptional circumstances. Unfortunately this blanket ban endangers the lives of those in need of a donated organ. Here is a hypothetical example. A gay man marries a woman and has a daughter. They then divorce because the man realizes he is gay. The man enters into a monogamous sexual relationship with another man that carries as little risk of HIV as a monogamous heterosexual relationship. The gay man’s daughter suffers kidney failure in both kidneys. After some time of treatment she is in serious need of a transplant. A test is done on the father and there is a requisite DNA match. The doctors set aside this match and look elsewhere because they have much higher preference for a donor who is straight. It is difficult to find a matching donor elsewhere. This girl’s life is being endangered because of a blanket policy that does not apply to the circumstances and is clearly discriminatory. This is the fault of the Harper government through failure to exercise their responsibility. I also wonder whether this regulation is an invasion of provincial jurisdiction. The Supreme Court might actually use its precedence criteria to strike down this regulation when I think about it. Thumbs down again to the Harper government.